New Zealand Parliament Considering Legislation Obligating Employers to Accommodate Flexible Working Arrangements

The New Zealand press is reporting on new legislation under consideration in New Zealand's Parliament that would obligate employers to accommodate flexible working arrangements. Briefly, the bill would allow employees caring for children under five, disabled children, or dependent relatives, to ask their employer for a flexible working arrangement. The employee could specify changes to hours of work, days of work, or the place of work, to accommodate their family obligations. So, for example, a parent of a young child could tell their employer that he or she wanted to work three days a week instead of five, or that he or she wanted to leave at 4pm each day to make it back in time to pick up a child from school. A parent could also suggest periodically working from home instead of at the office for childcare purposes.

The employer would have to accommodate the request, unless it could point to one of nine specified grounds showing that it was unable to do so. Among other things, a request could be refused if the employer could show it could not reorganize work among other staff, or if the request would result in unreasonable extra cost.

The draft bill can be downloaded from Parliament's website (PDF file)

This is pretty groundbreaking legislation. What are the prospects that such legislation could ever pass in Congress? What impact would it have on the competitiveness of U.S. businesses? Many issues to consider on both sides of the debate. As per an earlier post today, absent legislation, litigants in the United States seem to to be taking matters into their own hands when it comes to balancing work and family obligations.